Hector Charreton: Sculpting time, inhabiting matter

Paris Design Week 2025 at Hôtel de Lille

“I have always picked up stones. Perhaps to keep a trace, perhaps to hold on to something of time.”
— Hector Charreton

There is, in Hector Charreton’s creations, something that precedes words.
An ancient breath, a buried memory. His furniture-sculptures do not merely fill a space: they seem to tell of a passage, a slow transformation, an intimate dialogue with matter. At only 27 years old, this young designer, founder of Studio Divague in Bordeaux, is already recognized for his unique universe where stone, wood, metal, and glass meet.

On the occasion of Paris Design Week 2025, the Hôtel de Lille opens its doors to him. Three of his pieces will be displayed there: the Menhir mirror, the Deidra table, and the Tourmaline lamp. Three fragments of the same inner landscape, three invitations to slow down time in order to better observe its traces.

 

A language born from stones

Hector’s story begins long before his studio, long before his first pieces. It takes root in his childhood, between Saint-Cloud and Le Bouscat, near Bordeaux. Every weekend, he followed his mother through flea markets and brocantes: “I always came back with a little stone, a quartz, a fossil. It was my ritual.”

In his grandfather’s living room, a mineral enthusiast, he discovered an old gemology manual. Its worn pages became a secret atlas: each stone carried a story, each reflection a mystery. In the evenings, in his childhood bedroom, he lined up his treasures on a shelf, built imaginary cabins, invented miniature landscapes.

“I grew up with the idea that matter speaks. Stone, metal, wood… each has its own language, and I simply try to listen.”

Later, his stepfather, a bronzesmith, introduced him to working with metals, teaching him how to master heat, to sense the melting point where matter transforms. This intimate and physical relationship with creation never left him.

 

From gesture to intention

After graduating with a science baccalaureate, design became an obvious choice. Hector joined the École de design de Bordeaux, studying product design, but was not satisfied with purely academic teaching. He needed to touch, to feel, to learn with his hands. Very quickly, he joined the workshop of a master craftsman: “That’s where I understood that welding was not just a technique. It is a language. The way two metals join together already tells a story.”

This pursuit of the right gesture continued in Biarritz, at Blunt Studio, where he spent eight months. There he discovered another approach: to think of the object as a bridge between sculpture and use. This fertile tension became the core of his work.

In 2022, he signed his first major piece: the Oxyde table. A raw, patinated, almost mineral surface: a table that seemed to have traveled through the ages. Presented at Paris Design Week 2024, it caught the attention of LSD Galerie in Paris, which now represents him, alongside Coutume Studio in Bordeaux and Monde Singulier.

 

To wander, to create, to begin again

His studio bears a name that says it all: Divague. “To wander is to lose yourself in order to find yourself again. It is accepting that nature guides us more than we guide it.”

In his Bordeaux workshop, stone blocks, steel sheets, glass shards, and wooden planks pile up in a carefully orchestrated disorder. Hector always begins by observing: the veins of a quartz, the scars of oxidized metal, the shadows cast by a crack. Then he assembles, polishes, hammers, patinates, until a presence is born.

“I want my pieces to carry the memory of time. To seem as if they have always existed, and yet be undeniably of today.”

Each of his creations expresses this tension: between brutality and subtlety, archaism and modernity. The Menhir mirror captures light like fragments of an ancient sky. The modular Deidra table plays with oxidized metal strata, evoking miniature geological landscapes. The Tourmaline lamp traps transparency, as if a crystal shard had been suspended in time.

Hector Charreton, remember his name, aims to blur the boundary between art and design, between sculpture and object.
For him, design is a way of translating his universe and emotions through an intention, a creative impulse, which has guided him in every step since his earliest memories.

This instinctive desire to communicate with everyone in a universal language is fulfilled through the expression of matter.

For him, matter is an emotional language that everyone interprets personally. Raw materials, massive and primitive forms, imperfections, earthy tones: this is the alphabet with which he composes his surprisingly refined and warm creations.

His guiding line: to make his audience travel, to wander…

 

At Hôtel de Lille: when design inhabits history

In the lounges of the Hôtel de Lille, these pieces find a natural setting. By welcoming Hector, the hotel confirms its role as a conduit: a place that celebrates the art of living and opens itself to emerging talents.

From September 4 to 13, 2025, visitors to Paris Design Week will be able to discover this singular work in an intimate journey, at the crossroads of design and sculpture.

“I like the idea that my pieces speak more than I do. That they can touch, without needing to justify themselves.”

 

A universe already collected

Today, Hector’s creations are represented by LSD Galerie in Paris, Coutume Studio in Bordeaux, and Monde Singulier. His pieces move between exhibitions and private collections, attracting the interest of both amateurs and professionals. But despite this growing success, Hector maintains an instinctive approach:

“I move forward by small stones, just like when I was a child. I let time do its work, I let myself be guided.”

And this is undoubtedly where the strength of Hector Charreton lies: creating objects that seem out of time, and yet deeply rooted in ours.

 

Practical information

Paris Design Week 2025
Exhibition of creations by Hector Charreton
From September 4 to 13, 2025
At Hôtel de Lille, Saint-Germain-des-Prés

 

Colombe de la Taille